Stop EvE Apathy

Monday, 6 February 2012

The main reason why the current members of the CSM have attained and appear to believe they can retain power is simply due to using their members to power bloc voting members from their null sec alliances.

As such the numbers and views show that a vast number of players are not interested in voting and thus whilst you may be blissfully unaware, your interests may not be being fully supported.

Chance are that if you are an industrialist, moreso a miner, a member who plays in high sec, low sec or worm hole space then your interests may be being neglected by the current CSM.

I wont tell you how to vote, but I would like to urge you to possibly research the issues further on the EvE forums but most importantly I would urge you to Vote in CSM 7 this March.

Considering the Mittani's Representation:

"One interesting stat to look at quickly might be the level of apathy or representation Mittens has.

According to his own reported figures in the last election he got 5k+ votes, keeping things simple and being generous lets make this 6k. According to CCP there are approx 745k
active players. So assuming they are all even maxed out with 3 chars
this means roughly (745k / 3) = 248k active accounts at least.

As such it means that the representation of active accounts based on the previous Mittani electorate at best is about:

(6 / 248) * 100 = 2.4 percent.

As such it is hardly a convincing figure that he does in fact unequivocally represent the player interest, far from it." - Delici Feelgood

It
also means that it would take very little in terms of representative
votes opposing the Mittani to easily re-address any power afforded to
him through his bloc voting methods.

EvE
Online needs your support. Currently the CSM council of EvE is heavily
if not completely composed of null sec power bloc representatives. The
attitude of some of these Council members is focused on self interest,
as an example we can see from some of the comments of the existing
Chairman.

Quotes from The Mittani:

"The luxury of
my popularity is that I don't have to bother lying to my voters about
who and what I am. You get exactly what you voted for: a manipulative
sadist who makes no apologies for who or what he is. "

"I
ran for CSM on a platform of explicitly being a manipulative bastard,
because it takes someone like me to actually bring CCP around to reason."

"Every CSM represents their own constituents. Some have delusions about 'representing everyone'. I do not."

"I'd
kind of like to see Learning Implants vanish ........ However, this
isn't really a major priority for me. I might bring it over beer in
Islenskibarinn, but it's not going to be a summit topic and something I
expend vast amounts of political capital on, like I have on supercaps.

and then from recent CSM Minutes:

One
CSM stated a point in favor of removing learning implants, as that
would be a nerf to highsec income, and he is always in favor of those
where possible. Other members of the CSM were quick to object to that
suggestion. Another CSM objected to "his peeps being thrown under the
bus".

You can also
see from the recent minutes of the CSM council the focus that is
orientated towards selfish interests but at the same time the neglet of
other players interests for personal gain.

I
would urge you to read through the minutes to evaluate them for
yourself, but the easiest way to see the focus is looking at the minutes
summaries on the last page, which shows the importance of null sec with
its own focus afforded in the minutes, the majority of other points
being mutually of interest to everyone but if you look further into the
details you can see how most of the focus is specifically designed to
still be of value to the CSM members or a detriment to others.

As
an example, even though wormholes get a small section of focus, this
focus is in fact to allow capitals to enter WH space in order to destroy
small power bases.

As a result your potential of fun
in the game may not be as a good as it could be as a result. Especially
when you remember that some of you may be paying CCP to play EvE online.

One obvious example might be the push to make T2 more controlled and competative in null sec. A move away from a free market where player choices would normally have an impact on the economy not enforced mechanics:

CSM minutes May 2011: "The CSM believes that nullsec needs to be more self-sufficient from hisec, at the industrial level. The CSM suggested that nullsec should be able to produce T2 goods at higher margins than in hisec. Many ideas were thrown around, such as making T2 production superior in nullsec compared to hisec as well as adding many more factory and research slots in nullsec outposts. The CSM suggested that high technology products come from nullsec - they can be done in hisec, but with better margins in null. The CSM was intrigued by the idea of allowing meta-level item production in lowsec, creating a continuum of t1 - meta - t2 across hi/low/null. Most of the CSM favored the idea of increasing invention chances in 0.0 compared to hisec."

CCP's original intention for the CSM was that of unbiased represntation from the playerbase to support all interests, this can be seen from their document explaining the purpose and details of the council.

"The key question that council members must consider before casting their
vote is whether or not the issue at hand has the potential to improve
or otherwise benefit the entire EVE society, and not just a select group
within the community that was successful in bringing attention to
their unique case. Seeing the big picture—in this case, the needs of a
society with over 300.000 individuals—is the primary responsibility of a
CSM Representative, and reconciling that view with the interests that
won them the election is the greatest challenge they will facein this
implementation.

... and ...

CCP is unable to accommodate
any issue considered detrimental to the collective interests of EVE ,
particularly if the issue(s) touch upon meta-level concerns."

And given the process that points of interests are placed infront of CCP at their meetings you can also see potential levels of control easily afforded to censor or propose points specific of interest to only the council, thus neglecting points that may be relevant to you.

In short to get a topic in front of CCP:

1) You place a topic of interest on the CSM forums and then have to get a 25% interest of
the previous electorate in it OR Have a CSM council representative
simply place one.

2) Prior to the beerfest in iceland, *cough*, I
mean meeting with CCP where those ideas will be put forward the CSM
council has the power to vito which topics to present. This means that the council simply has the opportunity to decide not to include your point in their luggage.

3) Even if any get through the above then the CSM represent those interests "for you" to CCP.